Category: Japan

Cycling the Inland Sea

Took a ferry from Onomichi, where we’re staying in a “bicycle hotel,” to Ikuchi Island in the Seto Inland Sea. Rented bikes, then cycled back across islands and bridges (including the one in the photo), and past a children’s playground.

Bicycle-Friendly Hotel

Last night we slept in a museum designed by starchitect Tadao Ando on Naoshima Island. Tonight we sleep in a bicycle-friendly hotel in a former warehouse on a wharf in Onomichi. There’s a bike hanger in each room for those with bicycle separation anxiety.

Happy Scene

Our day pursuing art on Naoshima Island was interrupted by this happy scene. The men were having a great time occasionally hollering and making the platform sway, rise, and drop. Meanwhile the kids on the platform maintained both their composure and the rhythm on a taiko drum.

Frank Lloyd Wright in Japan

It was rainy, a good day to change plans and ride a bullet train for 230 miles to visit Meiji Mura, an architecture museum. After coffee in the lobby of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Tokyo Imperial Hotel, we explored many of the 60 buildings. We then rode a bullet back.

Temples 52 and 53

Explored on foot, helped by two trains. Shikoku 88 temples (52, 53), pilgrims, a castle, a museum designed by Tadao Ando all about a novel, a convenience store, pre-schoolers shouting “hello” and “konichiwa,” houses and gardens, kind people, rice fields ready for harvest, … .

Cycling across the Sea

Rented bicycles, cycled across Japan’s Inland Sea on part of the Shimanami Kaido trail. The trail provides spectacular views as it crosses huge bridges and small islands.

88 Temples

Pilgrims have been backpacking the Shikoku 88 for hundreds of years, visiting 88 temples on a 750 mile route around the island of Shikoku. We stored our backpacks in a locker at Matsuyama’s main train station then walked between a few temples.